


Perfectionist

by dollteeth



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: 1930s, Creepy, Gen, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-17
Updated: 2011-01-17
Packaged: 2017-10-14 20:15:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 506
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/153031
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dollteeth/pseuds/dollteeth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tom had always shown an unusual interest in the vegetable garden.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Perfectionist

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written in August 2005.

The back lot behind the orphanage had a vegetable garden that the children were supposed to tend to when they weren’t being kept busy at school. The garden was dull and a bit depressing to look at except at the height of summer. There were some bedraggled tomato bushes and a few cabbages, and occasionally the garden bore carrots and radishes that were somewhat edible. The garden idea had been a moderate success, overall — the children liked having an excuse to get their hands dirty, and they got a certain amount of pride whenever they managed to grow a proper vegetable.

Tom Riddle’s tiny plot of garden was in the back corner. It was partially shaded half the day by a supply shed, and sat on a slight incline so that the rain tended to run down the ground and drown it. For this reason, the matron was always bewildered when his patch was always the most successful. Two years ago he’d grown several plump, sweet tomatoes; last year it had been a basket’s worth of healthy carrots.

This year he was growing pumpkins.

Tom had always shown an unusual interest in the vegetable garden. He tended to his corner every day after school and spent most of his weekends in the garden, sitting in the shade and doing homework when there weren’t any weeds to pull. Now that it was summer, Tom spent his recreation time caring for his three half-grown pumpkins. He glared at any smaller children who got too close to the garden when they were playing, but otherwise he seemed completely unaware of the existence of anyone in the world but himself and his pumpkin patch.

He knew, of course, that the strip of earth he’d been given wasn’t as good as some of the other ones in the garden. He also knew, because he’d read it in a book, that normal plants didn’t grow as fast as his. It was part of the reason he liked his garden so much — somehow, despite the muddy earth and the shade from the supply shed, his garden was still the best. There was nothing special about the soil, and there wasn’t anything special about the seeds he used. He reasoned that the only reason his garden was special was because of something he did.

And it _was_ something he did. Whenever Tom noticed a dent or a blemish on one of the pumpkins, he got angry and by the next day it was gone. When he saw that one of them was growing into the wrong sort of shape, he thought about letting the weeds choke the vine so that he wouldn’t have to deal with the imperfection. Over the course of the next week, the shape righted itself.

“You’re going to be the best vegetables anyone grows,” Tom informed his pumpkins as he pulled weeds. “Because if you aren’t I’ll throw you at the wall and break you.”

He knew that plants didn’t have ears, but it still felt as though they listened.


End file.
